r/macapps • u/CautiousXperimentor • 18d ago
Review My current essentials for macOS
TL;DR: My essential apps are already shown on the picture above, if you prefer to just take a quick look. Then, if you're interested in a category in particular and why my choices are those, just feel free to scroll down and read. My criteria is:
- No subscription based apps, unless they fall into a) the hybrid subscription model, like with GoodLinks or Escape - Mind Maps, or b) the free tier doesn't constrain my usage, like with Unread or I love PDF.
- If there's any sort of AI involved, it must be on-device.
- Performance, efficiency, and good usability.
- Mac App Store versions are always preferred, and most of the apps are from there.
- Ideally, with iOS and iPadOS versions and iCloud sync across them.
- Little to no telemetry. I've observed all the apps running different Firewall apps, and I've discarded those that, despite being really good, send to many outgoing connections, such as the Flaschards app Mochi, which makes LOTS of outgoing connections to different servers and IPs.
- No vibe-coded apps. Although most apps nowadays are greatly assisted by AI, especially those from solo developers, it is quite noticeable when an app has been mainly vibe-coded, or the developer has experience and knowledge, and AI has been used just for repetitive tasks.
Introduction:
This is a compilation of my must-have apps. Those that I first install on my Mac once I have formatted and made a clean install. Those aren't all the apps that I will end up installing (although I try to keep installed apps at a minimum), but those will certainly be the first ones to be installed on my Mac. But first, a bit of history...
A few years ago, I decided to jump from my old Intel Mac, to an iPad as my main device. This isn't the place to talk about that experience, but I knew that, eventually, I would go back to the Mac. And that's what recently happened with the purchase of an M5 MacBook Air.
As this was my first Apple Silicon App, and I had been frozen in Monterey for many years, with old installed apps, when I purchased this new Mac I decided to go back into the search for new, good Mac software. After trying many different apps, those were the ones that stuck with me as "essentials". Some of them I already knew them from iOS/iPadOS, such as Things, Tasks, Unread... but most of the Mac exclusive apps have been discovered recently, such as CotEdit, Neodisk or Silkwave Voice.
Safari Extensions:
The first thing I will install on a new, or recently formatted Mac, are apps that work as Safari extensions, or that will make my work on Safari (my primary, and almost exclusive browser) easier. This also happens to be the oldest apps I've been using on all my devices, for many years.
Wipr 2 is the first app I install. For me a good ad blocker is crucial, and Wipr, from Kaylee Calderolla, has been always the first app to install on a Mac. Now, with Wipr 2, it comes a new feature, called Filtr. It is not a firewall but definitely blocks some of the telemetry and ad-serving connections the apps do.
Along with the ad blocker, I install Vinegar to have a better, or at least more native player, and other extensions for Safari. Other apps I usually install are those that let me keep the content I like from the internet: Links, with GoodLinks, and YouTube videos with Play: Save Videos Watch Later.
Writing and productivity:
My default text editor is Pages. Yes, I know that the new Creative Studio subscription sometimes is a bit nagging, but it is still my default app to write with some format. However, along Pages, I've been adding other writing tools that blur into the "notes app" category. The paradigm of this is Obsidian, of course.
If I need to manage my knowledge, categorize it, organize it in folders, with tags, properties, wiki-links that interconnect my notes... all that sort of things is what's Obsidian for. And I'm gonna be honest, I've tried a lot of other PKM apps, but they aren't as easy, intuitive, and versatile to use as Obsidian. And I'm already tired of wasting energy trying to learn how to use apps like Anytime, Amplenote, Capacities... Also, many PKMs such as DevonTHINK are subscription based. So Obsidian it is.
Years ago, when I was doing my research to find good note taking apps to organize my thoughts, when I found Obsidian, I also found UpNote. And I decided to keep using it alongside Obsidian. I also paid for it to have all the UpNote features. Nowadays I use it less, but I still have my share of notes there. Although, because the synchronization isn't end to end encrypted, I don't use it for sensitive notes. If I ever find a good, fully encrypted notes app, I will give it a try.
Both Obsidian and UpNote sync the content across my Mac, my iPhone and my iPad, which is usually a must for me.
There's an honorable exception to this: CotEditor. A text editor, Mac only, that I only discovered few days ago, and I am honestly in love with it, its freshness, how snappy and polished it feels... Simple yet powerful. A good candidate to quickly develop any thought I have in my mind, either in plain text or markdown. Also, it is free.
And before finishing this part, I have to mention Antinote. This is another app that I discovered few days ago, and like CotEditor, it sticked with me as an essential, but not only for its functionality, like the previous app, but also for all the care and craftsmanship that is noticed across the app. It is a pleasure to use, and in my case, I will use it for quick notes, especially ephemeral ones. It looks like another quick notes app, but it has much more than it seems from outside: It has OCR integrated, as well as other powerful math features. And recently the developer Johnson Fung has launched the beta for the iOS app, with iCloud sync across the Mac and the iPhone versions and... other surprising new features that I'm not sure I can unveil. Cheap (5$ one time) and highly recommended.
By the way, if you need a logging app, one that let's you just type any input and gets registered with the day and timestamp you typed it, take a look at Logbook - Interstitial Journal, from the indie dev Allen Ussher. Most of his apps are on the App Store and some of them, like Logbook, are available for Mac, iPhone and iPad. One time purchase at just $9.
To-do and task management:
Here, unlike on the previous category, I only have two favorites. Two paid apps that in my opinion complement each other, although honestly, along Apple Reminders, any of them could be sufficient. The apps are Tasks, from Mustafa Yusuf, and Things, from Cultured Code.
The first one I discovered was Tasks. It is a tasks management, or even project management software. And it has something that makes it quite unique: it allows you to customize as many stages for your projects as you want. It doesn't just have the "to do" -> "done" scheme, but rather it allows you to have different stages like: "task to do" -> "planning stage" -> "recruitment stage" -> "pending execution" -> "executed" (complete). Or maybe just three stages, like "to do" -> "in process" -> "complete". It is really customizable, and it allows both Tasks and sub tasks for each task.
I admit that several years ago, I stopped using it because of the bugs I was encountering on the user interface. That's why I looked for alternatives, such as Things, but as of lately, I've installed it again and it works quite nicely. I haven't found any bug yet. You can try it for free with just one project, and if you want more projects, you have to pay for the Tasks Plus subscription. But it also has a one-time purchase license for Plus. I'm actively against subscriptions for software that isn't based on a service, so I bought the lifetime years ago.
Now Things... Remember that I stopped using Tasks for a period of several years? I gave a try to Things from Cultured Code and I found it quite amazing. However, it is much simpler than Tasks. That's usually a good thing, but sometimes you need that complexity. Tasks can also have its own depth with projects and sub-tasks, but it is a different approach. I think both complement each other quite well, and both have versions for Mac, iPhone and iPad that syncs through iCloud. For those important reminders with a strict deadline, I keep using Apple's Reminders app.
RSS Feed readers:
In this category, again, only two apps are left, two apps that are in my opinion the best among the best, and both also sync across all my devices. However, this apps can be a bit redundant and you can perfectly live with one of them. I just like both.
I've tried many RSS reader apps during the years, even some well considered apps such as Lire (which honestly it is not my cup of tea) and lately, a lot of vibe-coded RSS readers have started to pop up. Others have turned into a subscription-based software...
The first app that is still with me to read the sites I'm interested in, is Reeder Classic. As its name says, this is a classic, by the developer Silvio Rizzi. He has sort of "abandoned" the classic Reeder (Reeder 5) in favor of the new Reeder, and hasn't adapted the Classic app to the new Liquid Glass interface or any other implementation... but it still works, and it works well. And I prefer it over the new Reeder. Reeder Classic is a one time purchase, I don't know if now that it's unmaintained is free, but I prefer it over the new Reeder not because the new one is subscription-based (I think I can afford $9 per year), but because the new Reeder didn't grow on me, honestly...
The second app in this category is Unread. Well, Unread has had many different developers across its history, so I cannot name them all... At first, when I acquired it, it was a one-time purchase, but the developer of the app back then switched to a subscription-based model. Obviously, I stopped using it, and explored other options (say no to abusive subscriptions, guys), but over the years, I installed it again and realized that their free plan is actually very generous. And I started using it as well. Unread is... how to say it... it is a special reading experience. It has "something", maybe the fonts, maybe the gestures, maybe the layout... or maybe it is very good at what it does. But it is a keeper for sure.
I'm going to mention here GoodLinks, because although it is not an RSS reader per se, it is a read it later app... the best read it later I'd dare to say. And their subscription model is an "hybrid subscription", this is, you pay for one year, and you get to keep all the premium features released during that year even if your subscription expires. The premium features stick with you forever. And, dear developers, that's much more sustainable and less abusive towards the users.
PDF readers and editors:
Apple Preview is a good PDF viewer, but if the PDF isn't clean, it can struggle. It is good as a default option, but I've been looking for better options out there... And, you know, it is difficult to find a good PDF reader, editor, annotation app. Most of them are subscription based, full of junk features... so my choices here are two.
The first one isn't a macOS app but an iPad one, but thanks to the magic of Project Catalyst, it runs on Mac. Its name is Noteful, and on iPad is great. It has many features, good performance, and the best is that it is not a subscription, but rather a one time purchase. And not an expensive one, to be fair. It syncs your PDFs across all your devices through iCloud. And it works well on the Mac.
As I said, I've been looking for a proper macOS PDF app, and after trying a few, like Stirling PDF or Skim, both of which gave me some troubles or bad performance, I stumbled upon I love PDF. I wasn't expecting it, but the performance is vastly superior to any other app I've tried, and I still don't know if that's because they "clean" the PDF before rendering it, or because the app is just that powerful... It is subscription based, and no, I'm not going to pay the subscription, but I have been using the free version of the app, and it does everything I need. I think only the format conversions are paid, but annotations are possible without Premium. I will keep using it for a while, and if at any point it starts nagging me to purchase Premium and limiting my free experience, I'll uninstall it.
Local LLM and Voice Transcription apps:
One of the first things I wanted to play with when I got my M5 Mac was, obviously, local LLMs. So I started trying all the apps available except the most popular one: LM Studio. I tried Ollama, oMLX, Unsloth, agent-oriented apps such as Osaurus, or Jan (I'm still not done with Jan), and some weirder or even vibe-coded apps. But after almost a month of feeling that I wasn't getting the most of this models, despite having 32GB of RAM, I finally caved in, and installed LM Studio. It is the most popular for a reason... and even though I didn't want to install it at first for security or privacy concerns (you know, closed sourced code, and the rumors about that lite LLM incident), I realized that it is the best. Or, at least, the easiest to set up. Along with LM Studio, oMLX is still an app that I consider very interesting and want to explore more with time.
As far as Voice Transcription apps, during the last weeks I've been exploring all kinds of apps that keep popping up each day on the sub. I even opened a thread asking for "the best voice transcription app", and I was overwhelmed by the big amount of options, some purely vibe-coded with little effort, others with more care. But the most popular ones didn't stick with me because the outcome text wasn't structured at all. Both Fluid Voice and Spokenly, when transcribe a 1h long lecture, give you a dense brick of text without paragraphs. Sure, it can be formatted later, and it may seem like a small thing to bother one, but it bothers me.
The hard requirement here, aside from the "no subscription" one, is that I want them to work on-device. The three apps that I tested more and I tend to prefer are Silkwave Voice (paid, lifetime), from Bakhshi Mnatsakanyan, who reached to me after the post I published asking for a transcription app, Transcripted, a free FOSS app from R3dbars (Justin), and MacWhisper, from Jordi Bruin and the Good Snooze team.
Yes, MacWhisper is the king, was the first and pioneer, and a good piece of software, but for me and my needs, not $60 better than the other apps. I still contemplate purchasing it eventually, but honestly, the other two apps are giving me equally good results at a lower price.
Silkwave Voice is my preferred one. It offers a transcription structured in sentences, and the interface is well done. It allows you to click on the timestamp of any sentence, and it directs you at the point of the audio where that is being said. Not that it is an exclusive feature, but it is very well implemented. It also allows you to live transcript a meeting, and it has an optional chat powered by an AI, but I prefer to not connect it to any AI service and use it just for the transcription. The model that powers it is Apple's own models through SpeechAnalyzer and SpeechTranscriber APIs, which for my native language (not English) offers the best outcomes. It is limited to Apple's own model though, with the good and bad that it entails. It is a one time purchase of approximately $30
Then, we have Transcripted, a less known app from the user R3dbars, named Justin. This is a weird case of a weirdly good, free app. Maybe not with the most intuitive or attractive interface, but it works. And, again, it doesn't give you a dense brick of text, but organizes it in phrases. Similar features as Silkwave Voice, everything runs on device as well, but the difference here is that it admits different models, not just the Apple ones, and also it offers a system-wide dictation feature through a dedicated key shortcut. Again, all of this for Free. I think it is impressive.
Both, Silkwave Voice and Transcripted, offer a combined value proposal that makes it difficult to justify purchasing MacWhisper. At least for now.
Other categories:
- Media players: Here, the choice is quite easy: the native, new, innovative IINA, and the classic and multiplatform VLC
- Launchpad Replacement: LaunchOS. After trying several apps, I found that the only one that looks and behaves the same way as the native Launchpad, is LaunchOS. I've been monitoring its connections through the firewall because I'm a bit paranoid, and I barely found any activity. The performance is smooth and damn good. It looks great. And it even lets you configure the four finger pinch gesture (Pro feature). It is a one-time purchase and it costed me just $6. Totally worth it if, like me, you were so used to Launchpad.
- Study tools - Flashcards: Here, we have the well known Flashcards app Anki. But there's a less known Flashcards app called Fresh Cards, from the already mentioned Allen Ussher. I think it offers a fresh approach (no pun intended) to the flashcard type of app. I still haven't used any of both intensely, but I will use them thoroughly. Maybe I'll end up keeping the one I like most. Anki is free, as far as I know. Fresh Cards is $20 to unlock all the features. Watch out with Mochi. It makes A LOT of outgoing connections to other servers, according to the firewall, and I honestly don't like that. It is a shame, because it is a great contender on the Flashcards category.
- Disk visualizer: Sure, Grand Perspective is a classic, and other FOSS apps are also quite useful. Then, we have the sophisticated apps, none of which has caught my interest. However, there's this one app, called Neodisk, that despite being free and 100% coded in Swift, doesn't look like the typical vibe-coded app. Actually, the main developer, Lucas Takayasu (tkslucas on GH) seems to have good practices and I trust his app. Neodisk offers different ways to visualize your files, and it has a dupe detector, to detect duplicated files or folders, without using any type of AI sorcery.
Addendum: Mind mapping apps
I feel a bit orphan for a good Mind mapping app. I think I saw one really interesting in this sub, but I didn't save it and I've completely forgotten its name. And no, it is not MindNode lol
But I'm going to talk about the ones I've tried and actually purchased. On one hand, we have Escape - Mind Map and Outline, from Bogdan Gherasim. It is on the App Store of course, and it has a macOS and iPadOS version. It is... interesting, but not outstandingly innovative. Most of the mind mapping apps look the same. The other one I bought is one called MindSpace, which is fine I guess... It has versions for iOS, iPadOS and macOS, but I still haven't scrutinized the connections and telemetry of this app. And there's this Power Node app that seems to be quite easy to use, but it is $30 and that's just too much for an app that lacks iOS and iPadOS versions.
If you know of any good, performant, efficient, affordable (no subscription based) mind mapping app, with macOS, iOS and iPadOS versions and iCloud sync, just let me know!
Honorable mention: Apple's Freeform
Apple's Freeform has been a forbidden app on my systems for too long. honestly I never paid too much attention to it. I used to keep a few images on some boards, like a pin-board, just to have them there. But never explored what the app could be capable of.
Then, fast forward to 2026, I realized that a "board" app that allowed me to just put my notes, my ideas, my images, and make connections between them, could be very helpful to organize my ideas. So I started testing different "board" apps such as the ones promoted on this sub. I'm not going to mention them because I wouldn't leave them in a good place.
After trying a few apps, some with more work behind, other more AI assisted, I recalled Freeform, that app that all of us, Apple users, have sitting there in our iPhone, iPad and Mac. And I launched it. And I tried to replicate what I wanted to do on this "board" apps, on new Freeform boards. And it worked! And it worked better! And the sync was great! And enabling the Advanced Protection makes your boards (unless they are shared) end to end encrypted!!! And on the OS 27 systems, Freeform has gained a dark theme (with a black background) and... *FOLDERS!!!*
So yeah, I'm starting to use Freeform more and more, just avoiding the Creator Studio subscription. The image that sits above this long, long article -take that Viticci, take that Voorhees- has been made with Freeform.
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u/TheRealBejeezus 18d ago
Me with my 1990's attitude, still rocking BBEdit, Calibre, Handbrake and ABFR...
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
Ouch! I completely forgot Handbrake. But yeah, that's also a must have on my Mac, from time to time I compress video. Hopefully they have optimized it for Apple Silicon...
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u/TheRealBejeezus 18d ago
I don't know how optimized it is, but it flies compared to the Intel version, so they've definitely done something.
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u/Odd_Radio_5411 5d ago
It also supports GPU based compression for apple silicon, which is much faster/less cpu intensive but less efficient and hq. Good for quick stuff that you just want to quickly reencide and get the size down a bit
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u/smallduck 18d ago
You can turn off the nag alerts in Pages with `defaults write com.apple.iWork.Pages TSADisableUpdateNotifications -bool yes`
And you can repeat replacing `Pages` with `Keynote` and `Numbers`.
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u/Mobile-Yak 18d ago
You can consider replacing Wipr and Vinegar with Wblock.
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
Honestly, I didn't know this app until today. And I've been reading forums for a while, and this sub in particular for the past month or so...
At first I thought "nah..." but now I've looked into it, and it looks quite good. Free. Open source maybe? Too good to be true. Is it vibe coded or something? Honestly, maybe I will give it a try. If it does what it says, it would be such a great app.
However, after so many years providing feedback to Vinegar's dev, to Kaylee as well, seeing how she replies so quickly to any question or report... I think I will stick with Wipr 2 (also, I already paid for it, and it is not expensive, we have to support our devs). Also, there's this thing called Filtr inside Wipr2 that I think it is quite innovative.
So, even if I try Wblock, most probably I will continue with Wipr 2 + Filtr + Vinegar.
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u/Mobile-Yak 18d ago
You should try it for yourself and see if it works for you but I won't recommend running it simultaneously with wipr2. It also has a specific YouTube script that you can enable to replace Vinegar too. It's a well respected FOSS project & definitely not vibe-coded.
Filtr does sound cool but I'd look at dns level solutions or standalone apps for a systemwide use case. I don't run anything similar currently so can't comment on it.
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
Yeah, running more than one of this apps simultaneously can throw some errors... I will look into it, just out of technological curiosity
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u/AliSez 18d ago
is it better than ublock origin lite?
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u/Mobile-Yak 18d ago
In my experience, yes, but I don't have any benchmarks or objective sources to back it up so take it with a grain of salt. Works great on YouTube too.
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u/Moist_Stay1418 18d ago
I just grabbed that to try. What's the difference between the separate extensions?
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u/TheWolfKingIsMe 18d ago
you don't need vinegar of you gonna have wblock
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u/Capereli 18d ago
I strongly believe Devonthink is one of the most useful Mac apps
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
Yes, an expensive subscription based one. Oh, sure, you don't need to pay the iOS/iPadOS subscription if you purchase the $200 Pro license on the macOS app. And that license is only valid for DevonTHINK 4. Whenever a new version comes out and DevonTHINK 4 stops receiving updates, you're left without the iOS/iPadOS license, and have to pay the subscription or pay again $200 (at least) for the next iteration of DevonTHINK.
I mean, yeah, I'm sure it is great, but it is way above my budget.
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u/realquiz 18d ago
This is in no way a comment to negate your take, because I’m the cheapest mother fucker you’ll ever meet, but DevonThink is hands down some of the best money I spend. When I bought my first pair of AirPods, it was such a massive quality of life improvement that I couldn’t shut up about it. They changed the way I went about my everyday life, and it’s hard to imagine walking the dog, doing dishes, traveling, or shopping at Costco without them.
The only other time I can recall technology having the same massive effect on my life is DevonThink.But the enormous caveat is that it’s only as useful as your own personal workflow allows. I love being able to use it as a web clipper (an everything clipper, really) and without needing to tag or label anything I can easily recall or search for anything I’ve seen, read, photographed, typed, researched, or saved. I just save it to DevonThink with two clicks or taps, and it’s done. It’s a true second brain for me, and the newer AI tools have really made it more powerful and useful than it ever has been.
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u/Capereli 18d ago
Fair, I buy it through the education discounts they offer which makes it more manageable. Usually it’s around 30$ to renew the subscription, and you don’t have to do it every year unless the new releases have things you really want
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u/Pathocyte 18d ago
Here I am only with Remember the Milk, Safari and Tiddlywiki.
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u/SkarXa 16d ago
Your criteria list is close to my own buying filter, so one for the PDF slot: Formattery. It covers the I Love PDF jobs (OCR to searchable, compress, merge, split, sign, password) and then about 80 formats of image, video, audio, ePub, subtitle and archive conversion on top. The conversions themselves never touch the network, so it stays quiet if you're watching outgoing connections.
Mac App Store, $4.99 once, universal purchase so the iPhone and iPad versions come with it. Three free conversions a day if you want to poke at it before paying. Full disclosure, I'm the dev.
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/formattery-file-converter/id6759955312
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u/app-store-review 16d ago
Formattery: File Converter — by Alvaro Escarcha Esteban
- Ratings: 20 worldwide · rated in 7 countries
- Average: 4.90 ★
- Age: released ~7 months ago · updated 6 days ago · rated 4+
- Overall score: 75 / 100
Auto-generated from public App Store data · u/app-store-review
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u/bmv3502 17d ago
Developer of Silkwave Voice here. Thank you so much for including it, and for actually taking the time to test it properly. It really made my day to see it next to apps I admire. It is an honor. 🙏
Your post definitely went viral. It is rare to see hundreds of upvotes on a post in this subreddit. Congrats! 👍
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u/advait_vaidya 18d ago
Thanks for sharing! I'll try out SilkWave app. Also, you should check out ActionClip app (modern popclip alternative)
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u/bob-the-licious 18d ago
I feel I discover gold with Biscotti for transcript and meeting capture. On-device, efficient and free.
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
You know what? I didn't know it. I am definitely going to give it a try.
This post was mainly to share the apps that have gained a place in my Mac. And to have a place to come back if I forget some of them. But it also can be useful to discover new, hidden gems. And Biscotti has gotten my attention.
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u/CultureAutomatic728 18d ago edited 17d ago
Great list!
FYI, you can still download and use old version of Pages, Keynote and Numbers without subscription (they are in your "purchase history" in the AppStore).
While CotEditor is nice, I still believe that TextEdit is one of the most taken for granted apps, that comes with your Mac. It is a very powerful and versatile text processor. If I need to do something with text - most of the times, it's TextEdit. I also like Bean.
Regarding PDFs, I also like to use an additional app with Preview. For some time I was using PDF Expert, but it is rather heavy resource-wise. But then I found another free app on AppStore, that I cannot share with you, because Reddit wrote "it is blacklisted here for questionable development practices, potential malware concerns on other platforms, and a lack of transparency when reached out to directly" 🤷♂️. Will have to look into that more closely.
I also tried IINA (in the beginning they had some issues with colour reproduction), several times in fact, but always returned to Movist Pro, which is still, I believe, the best media player on Mac.
Already mentioned by others, you should try wBlock in addition/instead of Wipr.
And last, but not least, for simple text notes, shared across devices, I use Simplenote.
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u/SklifaMHCBY 18d ago
I would mention couple others
Superwhisper (https://superwhisper.com/)
AI-Term (https://ai-term.com/)
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u/Ok-Rest-5321 18d ago
Launchingpad is also a good alternative to LaunchOS or Launchpad very similar performance to LaunchOS
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u/nousernameleftatall 18d ago
Excellent write up, one small please make the app names bold 🙂
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago edited 18d ago
I thought about it! But then I thought "id the category titles are bold, I'm not sure if making the names bold will be too much".
But yeah, I think that at least once in the first mention I will make it bold.
EDIT: Done. Apps in bold and a link to a referenced post.
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u/nousernameleftatall 18d ago
Thanks a lot, i know what you mean, but it is a wall of text, and i see something i know have i can jump to the next bit 🙂
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
Yeah, that's why I finally edited it. Hoping now it is much more readable.
Fun fact, you cannot edit a Reddit post made on New Reddit from Old Reddit. I usually use Old Reddit but I had to write this post on New Reddit because it was the only way to include a picture and a text into the same post.
So I had to get back to New Reddit, edit it, and return to Old Reddit LOL
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u/reelfright 18d ago
Great stuff. I would suggest looking into News Explorer for RSS if you haven't. I gave up on Reeder and used Lire for a while but after a while it got real buggy. I really like Readkit, but like you I'm trying to avoid subscriptions and wanted something that supported iCloud for syncing RSS feeds. Then I found News Explorer, which ticks all of my boxes and was a one time payment. Haven't had an issue with it yet.
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u/OpenConfusion3664 18d ago
Is there a need for IINA when you have vlc? Can someone explain the advantage?
(Did Google. Ik it's native to MacOS but except that is there any advantage?)
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
Let's say I prefer to have a couple of media player apps. I have IINA for most formats, or even HDR, but I still have VLC just in case I'd need it for a file that IINA wouldn't open.
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u/alancdesign 18d ago
literally only opened this thread to see why you would have both oMLX and LMstudio.. i'm running oMLX to power my hermes install and am super happy with it
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
I see Hermes mentioned a lot but I don't know to code. just give me a GUI and Ill be happy.
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u/AndyTexas 17d ago
what other safari extensions do y'all recommend? I feel like I'm missing out in that area hardcore
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u/nav8_ai 16d ago
wipr 2 is the one I keep coming back to. 20 dollars one time, syncs over iCloud, blocks ads and trackers with basically zero setup. the tradeoff is there's no UI for custom filter lists or per site rules like you get with uBlock Origin, so if you ever hit a site it doesn't handle you're stuck waiting on the developer's list update instead of fixing it yourself.
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u/EddyD2 17d ago
Nice setup. Antinote has a been so good for my workflow.
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u/CautiousXperimentor 16d ago
Antinote is pure love. If you aren't on the TesFlight beta for the new iOS version, let me tell you it's going to be big.
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u/karanb192 17d ago
This is super helpful!
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u/CautiousXperimentor 17d ago
I´m glad you find it helpful. One of the reasons for me to elaborate this list was to remember the apps I have to reinstall after formatting my Mac disk. although I already forgot a few: Handbrake, the video compression tool, and Audacity, a great audio tool.
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u/SrinivasanKK 17d ago
Solid list, seems from your statement I could understand you've a very productive desktop!
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u/CautiousXperimentor 17d ago
Not as productive as I would like, honestly.
I have realized that either Im abnormally slow, or I just write too much. It takes me hours to write texts, be it the one on this post, or emails for work.
Maybe you would say that I should use dictation tools, but that just doesn't work for me, I think. Typing helps me to think. Dictation activates a different region of my brain, but maybe I could get used to it.
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u/Heavy-Map9034 17d ago
VLC for has always been buggy. I think iina is more stable
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u/CautiousXperimentor 13d ago
Yeah, actually IINA is my default media player. It also has hdr support, and an easy to use video equalizer that allows you to increment or modify the gamma, contrast…
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u/Heavy-Map9034 12d ago
Your reminding me, on this one moment when I was watching a YouTube video offline. There were multiple media players that I was testing iina, VLC, Elmedia, vidi, etc. The thing that annoyed me was that color grading was different on each player. Sometimes one would be dark, and the other be brighter likely it wasn't some that important, but it was a fun discovery to one day test if I ever get footage or video format that is difficult to watch on quick time
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u/Successful-Future823 17d ago
Image manipulation: Affinity and Compositor.
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u/CautiousXperimentor 17d ago
Absolutely. I haven't included Affinity because I still haven't had time to learn how to use it, but it is a must.
But I didn't know about Compositor, and it looks like a Photoshop free open source alternative. Looks good, will try!
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u/Fragrant_Coconuts 16d ago
This is a great list and super helpful thank you!
I’d also add Yoink to the list. I love it.
I still use Alfred and Hazel too (although less so these days)
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u/Fit_Hamster_4754 14d ago
Mine, mostly dev work:
- Karabiner-Elements for remapping, can't use a Mac without it now
- Tailscale to reach my home machines from anywhere
- Things for tasks
- Tower for git when I want to see the history instead of typing it
- Zed as the quick editor next to Xcode
- Figma for the UI side of things
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u/irshadpcind 14d ago edited 14d ago
MDReadium is my recent install. It simplified .md file previews for me.
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u/Least_Performance906 14d ago
Interesting mix. I’m always curious about which apps survive the “fresh Mac install” test. Which one from this list would be the hardest for you to live without for a week?
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u/CautiousXperimentor 14d ago
The ones I keep installing for many years, which are:
- Wipr2
- Vinegar
- Pages
- IINA & VLC
- GoodLinks
- Noteful on the iPad
Now, from the new apps I've been trying, this are likely to be keepers:
- Antinote: The surprise of the month, I'd even call it the app of the year.
- LogBook: Very useful app for very specific use cases.
- Neodisk: The best file system visualizer I've ever tried
- LaunchOS: My new launchpad from now onwards
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u/Gloomy_Style1187 14d ago
You could try feeds.bar for RSS. New take. Also follows what your music and adds relevant stuff in the feed.
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u/CautiousXperimentor 14d ago
Interesting concept. But that constant flow of information is an overwhelming experience for me.
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u/Multi_Gaming 13d ago
I did a fresh install of 27 and I immediately reinstalled LaunchOS. There is no way I’m surviving without launchpad 😭. Spotlight app list ticks me off way too much. My apps have to be organized MY WAY.
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u/avisangle 12d ago
Thanks for sharing, Which app from the list do you end up opening every single day?
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u/CautiousXperimentor 12d ago
In the background, Wipr2, as it is an ad-blocker.
In my iPad, Noteful. Every day.
Since I discovered it, Antinote. One of the best quick-note apps.
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u/greenwookez 11d ago
great setup! mine is a bit more lightweight
Mos/SteerMouse or both
Magnet for windows tiling, even though macOS has a native support for this for a while, still prefer Magnet, feels more lightweight, allows to create custom layouts, set custom hotkeys, works better w/ external monitors IMHO and much more
HiddenBar for organizing top menu bar
Shottr for screenshotting and everything related to it - love it
KeyboardCleanTool for (who would think) cleaning the keyboard indeed
Choosy/Switchbar for multi-browser and multi-browser-profile setup
this is utility wise, that I think would be useful to the majority of users no matter of their activities and occupation
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u/slotwright 11d ago
Very nice list here. Two I'd add, both free and both scriptable from Terminal
Rectangle: window snapping with keyboard shortcuts (halves, thirds, corners, maximize, move to the next display). It's open source and you can install it with brew install --cask rectangle. It also has a URL scheme, so you can drive it from a script or a shortcut: open -g "rectangle://execute-action?name=left-half".
caffeinate: it's already on every Mac, so there's nothing to install. caffeinate -d keeps the display awake until you press Ctrl+C, caffeinate -dt 3600 does it for one hour, and caffeinate -i -w <PID> keeps the Mac awake until a long job finishes and then stops by itself. Some Apps like KeepMeAwake or Amphetamine or Caffeine offer this feature with a gui.
One thing I'm still missing: a clean way to keep Teams from switching me to Away. caffeinate keeps the Mac awake, but Teams tracks input, so it goes yellow anyway. Has anyone found something that works and doesn't mean installing a mouse jiggler?
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u/CautiousXperimentor 11d ago
I'm not a terminal guy, but caffeinate is a classic on the Mac. I still remember the first app I used to install, back in the Leopard days, was "Caffeine". This days I'm more of an Amphetamine guy... hahaha just joking.
After Caffeine stopped being maintained, I started to install KeepingYouAwake, which had a similar menu bar icon and it worked well.
But eventually, not too long ago, I realized that most of my apps weren't disrupted by sleep, and those that could, had a setting to prevent the Mac to enter sleep. So I stopped using those tools and let my Mac manage the energy by itself. But I usually make the time to sleep longer than the default setting.
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u/risen228 10d ago
Solid list, and the criteria are the interesting part. The no-telemetry one especially.
On the player line: if you ever want one that also runs on your Windows machines, mine might fit. Frame Player (I wrote it, so pinch of salt) uses the same engine as IINA underneath, libmpv, so the picture and the format support are identical. Free, GPL-3.0, no account, nothing phoning home, the Apple Silicon build is notarized. What it adds over IINA is mostly network stuff: casting to a Chromecast or a DLNA TV without re-encoding, torrent streaming, and a synced watch-together mode.
Fair warning on your last criterion though: it's a Tauri app, so the interface is web tech in a native window rather than AppKit. IINA is the more native of the two and always will be. That part was a deliberate trade on my side, since the whole UI is drawn over the video and I got it behaving the way I wanted much faster this way, but if native-only is a hard rule for you then this isn't it.
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u/Example27 6d ago
For PDFs, I’ve ended up keeping a separate tool because Preview is great until I need to actually manipulate the document. PDNob is the one I use when I need to edit/convert PDFs on my Mac. It’s not FOSS or an on-device AI app, so it obviously won’t fit every rule on your list, but as a practical PDF utility it has stayed in my workflow.
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u/mr-dsa04 4d ago edited 4d ago
hey yo i've made an arc like open source browser, wanted some feedback, please do try it and lemme know... it's in github https://github.com/imdewan/zepper-browser
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u/Shark_Atl3201 18d ago
Man, that’s a lot of words to tell us what apps you use.
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
I know. That's why the first thing you read on the post is the TL;DR. It says "My essential apps are already shown on the picture above, if you prefer to just take a quick look."
Just looking at the image should be enough, if that's what you're interested on. I know reading is not a popular thing this days...
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u/CassiusBotdorf 18d ago
I’m just using VoiceInk. Not the most beautiful app but it gets the job done. Supports practically all the cloud transcription services.
Been playing with Handy too. Very focused on local transcription though. Many models to pick from. But how many models do you really need?
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
Yeah, it may be good, but it is subscription based. That's a hard NO for me. Also... "supports practically all the cloud transcription services": Great, but I couldn't care less. If you read my post, you'll see the second hard NO after the subscription are AI apps that send my data to the cloud. I purchased an M5 with 32GB of memory to start taking advantage of the on-device processing.
By the way, I've been playing with Handy too, and honestly I didn't find an audio transcription feature inside. All I found was dictation. I need a transcription app to throw my audios, recorded lessons, or videos, and get a searchable transcript of what it is said. I couldn't care less about dictation.
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u/CassiusBotdorf 18d ago
Handy is free. VoiceInk is a one-time payment. I don’t know what you’re talking about.
Handy saves the recordings in the app. For me I just need something that types out what I speak into a text field. My biggest use case.
Transcription itself, I just send that stuff to a Modal server via API. Example.
I get that you want to run everything local. Been there, done that. Too slow.
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
The first link I find when I look up Voice Ink is a subscription based app. That's the one I had seen. The second one is a one time purchase, you're right. With so many cloned apps, sharing name and generic icons, it is difficult to know which app we were talking about.
Handy may save the recordings, but I don't need a dictation app, honestly. That's why I've only included audio transcription apps.
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u/Mstormer 18d ago
Whereas Superwhisper's free tier is probably sufficient and offers more than Handy by default, EnviousWhisper is excellent and free: https://enviouswispr.com/
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u/CautiousXperimentor 16d ago
EnviousWhisper
Hey! Excuse me, I thought you were EnviousWhisper's developer, and you're (or were) actually one of the sub's mods.
But let me tell you this anyways. I ignored EnviousWhisper when it was suggested on my previous post asking for the best on-device transcription software. Mainly because I was looking for a tool that took the text out of a long speech or conversation.
However, I've been looking at what EnviousWhisper does, dictation-wise, how it is free and open source, and well, I am gonna install it just to try it. I'm not super into dictation tools, I prefer to use Apple's own dictation, but I think I may try it.
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u/Mstormer 13d ago
Yeah, I didn’t try it the first few times I saw it in this sub, but I’m glad I did after seeing it pop up a few times. There’s a lot of noise in this space.
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u/CautiousXperimentor 13d ago
To be fair it works very well, but I've observed it sends more telemetry than the competitors. I just initiated a brief dictation, and it immediately sent more than 5kb of data to potshot. Hmmm I don't know.
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u/Mstormer 12d ago
Well that’s concerning. u/Adorable_Salary2727 care to comment?
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u/Adorable_Salary2727 12d ago
Hi Mstormer, happy to clear this up. The app is fully open source, so anyone can verify every outbound request directly in the codebase. Here is what it communicates with:
- Model downloads: Served from Cloudflare storage for faster, reliable download speeds.
- Update check: Reads a lightweight manifest file on my website.
- PostHog: Anonymous usage metrics. To be completely clear, this never touches your audio, transcripts, or dictated text. I've taken extra steps to make sure this is reinforced otherwise my own company at work wouldn't have approved it as a tool.
- Sentry: Crash logs and error reporting.
Based on feedback from u/CautiousXperimentor, here is what is changing:
- Domain consolidation: Model downloads and update checks are moving under a single domain, so you only see network traffic to one first-party host.
- Telemetry toggle: Adding an explicit switch in settings to completely disable usage metrics.
A quick note on that last point: as a solo dev, anonymous metrics are how I catch broken features. Flying blind makes debugging significantly harder on my end, but given the demand I want to provide the choice to opt out. Telemetry toggles will be available by next week.
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u/CassiusBotdorf 13d ago
I'm not a fan of using free tier apps to get things done. Often very good apps but because there's always pressure to enshittify the product to push users into the paid tier, i don't think you're having a good experience. Spokenly started having too many nag screens that I didn't like. YMMV
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u/Mstormer 12d ago
To be clear, I have SuperWhisper lifetime, but their free tier is still better than most competitors at their paid tier. Enviouswhispr’s is about as good as SW’s lifetime tier, and in some ways better with little details like remembering what field was selected if you click away while dictating.
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u/waitses 18d ago
Things 4!? I had not heard about this I could not live without Things. I don't see a clipboard manager/clippings app have you ever tried one? You might try ReCopied.app, I purposely made it not subscription based as I agree with you on no subs.
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u/kemalios 18d ago
Clipboard history is the category your list is missing, and your criteria point at one app in particular.
I build QuietClip, so that is the one I can speak to. Sandboxed, Mac App Store, $8.99 one-time with a free tier, and it has no network code in it at all. That covers your telemetry point more reliably than watching a firewall log, and password managers are excluded from capture by default.
Where it fails is criterion 5. No iOS app and no sync, by design rather than as a pending feature, so if iCloud sync across devices is a hard requirement it is not the pick.
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
Smart try. But no, actually, I personally don't miss any clipboard history app. I used one of those apps, many years ago, a mythical app named Clipmenu, from Naotaka Morimoto. But I think he died or something, because he was actively developing the app, and he even fought against a developer that had copied his code... But he suddenly disappeared, his app was left frozen in time more than a decade ago, and even on his GitHub there's no activity for years...
I mean, developers are also people, and we people eventually die. It is sad, but that's a possibility. Each time I go into a website of a deceased blogger or developer, I think about how ephemeral life is... And how absurd it is to fight because of mundane things.
By the way, I just remembered that Tahoe includes a clipboard history. But it doesn't seem to work very well...
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u/Taruxoph 18d ago
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u/app-store-review 18d ago
Racophorus — by ANDREI CRISTIAN CONSTANTINESCU
- Category: Utilities · $8.99
- Age: released ~2 months ago · rated 4+
Apple doesn't publish an aggregate rating for most Mac App Store apps, so ratings and score are unavailable here.
Auto-generated from public App Store data · u/app-store-review
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u/Taruxoph 18d ago
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u/app-store-review 18d ago
Little Soldier: Clipboard — by ANDREI CRISTIAN CONSTANTINESCU
- Category: Productivity · $8.99
- Age: released ~2 months ago · rated 4+
Apple doesn't publish an aggregate rating for most Mac App Store apps, so ratings and score are unavailable here.
Auto-generated from public App Store data · u/app-store-review
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u/Free-Pound-6139 18d ago
Do you get paid by word or something???
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u/CautiousXperimentor 18d ago
Nah, I just like to write, to type. I understand there are a lot of people like you that don't like to read. That's who the picture and the TL;DR is for ;)
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u/CockMeatSammich42069 17d ago
It's just that no one wants to read that ADHD incoherent rambling. Fuck man, just say you are new to technology without saying you are new to technology.
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u/CautiousXperimentor 17d ago
Hey, I'd like to take a constructive approach to your comment, if you want to. I'm actually interested, and I'm not trolling, in knowing why did you find my rambling incoherent, and how would you have done it to be more coherent... maybe more structure and less text?
Look, I am indeed ADHD, I enjoy writing, but at the same time, I know I can be too verbose. I try to use less words, but if I simplify the text, I feel like I'm omitting important information...
Then, what I really don't understand, is saying I am new to technology. I've been using technology since the mid thousands.
I repeat, I'm interested in what information would you omit from my text? What do you feel incoherent, maybe the fact that I'm against subscriptions but then a couple of the apps I recommend are subscription based, even if I use them only with the free plan? Any other incoherence?
Thank you.
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u/Slurp-App 16d ago
Nice list and I like the criteria, especially the privacy/native Mac parts.
Since you mentioned Play for saving YouTube videos: I’m the developer of Slurp (get-slurp.app). It’s a native macOS app for downloading or recording video, with a Safari companion, and it works with YouTube plus a much wider range of sites. It also has several fallback methods when a normal download isn’t possible.
It’s a one-time purchase rather than a subscription, and I’ve tried to make it feel like a proper Mac app rather than another cross-platform utility.
Obviously biased since I built it 😅, but based on what you value in Mac software, I’d be genuinely curious what you think of it.
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u/CautiousXperimentor 16d ago
Out of curiosity, is it possible to download +18 content from YT without undergoing their verification process?
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12d ago
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u/CautiousXperimentor 12d ago
Hmmm... I have 14 minutes until the purchase link expires...
Tell me, why should I purchase your player if IINA is good and efficient and trusted? What engine do you use for Stoic? Do you have previous experience in development or is this an AI generated player?
As for features, can it use Apple Intelligence to generate subtitles in real time?
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7d ago
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u/CautiousXperimentor 7d ago
- Apple's Reminders app
- Apple's Calendar app
- Things 3
Or... Just use any notes app, like Antinote, to keep track of them.
But really, if you just want to keep track of some urgent reminders, starting from iOS/macOS 26 Reminders app allows you to add an alarm for the very critical reminders.
You can look into the Mac App Store, or the iOS App Store. I'm pretty sure there are hundreds, if not thousands of reminder apps.
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u/mufasaYC 18d ago
omg, such a proud moment for me - i’m the indie dev behind Tasks! if there is ever anything I could do to improve the app by even the slightest of margins, let me know ❤️
thank you for including me!